


comforts of home and hearth

by akelios



Category: Dresden Files - Jim Butcher
Genre: Dresden Files Kink Meme, F/M, Light Bondage, M/M, Minor Violence, Nightmares, Rape/Non-con References, Tentacles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-30
Updated: 2011-08-30
Packaged: 2017-11-20 00:55:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,256
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/579515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/akelios/pseuds/akelios
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the end I found myself dreading seeing everyone. I could feel their presences grating on my skin just thinking about them. Throwing myself into life wasn't working. I couldn't outrun or ignore my own thoughts. So I decided to try the other side of the spectrum. I made my arrangements and headed to Demonreach.</p>
            </blockquote>





	comforts of home and hearth

I took the _Water Beetle_ out to Demonreach because I wanted to be alone. After the disaster with Morgan, after Thomas' torture and the revelation of how deep Peabody's manipulation and treason had gone, I didn't want anything to do with other wizards. Sitting around my apartment when I wasn't working just reminded me of all the things Anastasia, who I was trying to only think of as Captain Luccio, and I had shared. Things that I had believed were born of, if not exactly love, then at least mutual regard and attraction.

Knowing that it was all a lie, that she'd been forced to feel and think what she had made it all horrible. Painful. Peabody had used her, and he'd made me a part of it. If I sat and thought about it too long, I grew more and more disgusted with myself for not seeing it, for not realizing that something was wrong sooner and maybe stopping some of the damage. Hells bells, I was a _wizard_. I was supposed to be wise, to know things that others didn't. Fat lot of good I had done the Captain.

I'd thrown myself into work and spending time with my friends to drive those thoughts out of my mind. It worked, sort of. I trained Molly, I hung out with the Alpha's and Butters, I ate a lot of home cooked meals with the Carpenters and I took every single job that came through. And sometimes at night I dreamt of Anastasia, of the Captain and having sex in front of the fire or a dozen other things that we had done together. Only instead of my real memories of what had happened, with Anastasia responding, being in it with me, she fought and screamed, biting and clawing, throwing magic at me that just slid off me as I laughed and spoke as if we were in love. I woke up from those dreams and had to rush to my little bathroom to be sick, over and over again until my throat was raw. Better than those were the dreams of the last battle with Peabody and holding Morgan while he died. Those hurt, of course, even if I never had liked Morgan the steel plated asshole, but at least I understood violence and death.

In the end I found myself dreading seeing everyone. I could feel their presences grating on my skin just thinking about them. Throwing myself into life wasn't working. I couldn't outrun or ignore my own thoughts. So I decided to try the other side of the spectrum. I made my arrangements and headed to Demonreach. It was the only place I was sure I could be reached and get back to Chicago in a hurry if need be, but also be sure that I wasn't going to get any random visitors like I would if I just locked myself in my apartment.

There was the added attraction of getting a new safe house ready. True, Demonreach wouldn't be as accessible as my little storage locker, but it would be a hell of a lot more secure and harder to find.

Demonreach...didn't exactly _welcome_ me, really. That was too human a term for what I felt when I stepped onto the sandy beach. Demonreach sensed my return and gave a sort of mental nod, as if I was a wayward child who had finally shown up where I was supposed to have been the whole time. Or a zoopkeeper who was checking me off on a list, 'One Harry Dresden, check' while being slightly exasperated that I had taken so damn long to show up for feeding time.

“Hang on a second.” I waved Mouse back. He whined, his front paws on the side of the boat, ready to join me. “I just want to make the introductions first. Demonreach can be sort of temperamental.” I didn't think the island would have a problem with Mouse. He was an animal, after all, and Demonreach seemed to like them just fine. But Mouse wasn't a normal dog and I didn't want to take the chance that the island would react badly to what made Mouse special.

I didn't bother speaking out loud. I could feel Demonreach inside of my mind, just like on the night of the battle. As I knelt to touch the sand, something else that I thought was likely completely unnecessary, I pictured Mouse and infused the thought with every emotional attachment that I had, every memory I could call up. Demonreach reacted, a thoughtful hum beneath my feet and in the back of my brain. Great. Demonreach would leave Mouse alone. I put up a few mental walls, nothing that would keep Demonreach out – I didn't think I was capable of doing that - but small barriers that would hint that I wanted some mental space. If we really did have a mutual respect, Demonreach would see them and not push. Hopefully.

“Alright. Come on over.” Mouse jumped, ignoring the dock entirely, and cleared the ten feet between the front of the boat and the shore. He landed with a quiet thump and barked. Not the earth shaking bark he used in battle, but not a normal dogs' bark either. It vibrated along my bones and through the bond with Demonreach I got the impression of amusement and greeting. “As long as you two are making friends.” I ruffled Mouses' fur and shifted my backpack on my shoulder, heading for the path that led up to the keepers' house on the top of the hill.

It took me a couple of trips to bring everything up; a tent, sleeping bags, food and water and the tools and other supplies I thought I might need. Mouse stayed with me at first, but after an hour or two of work he couldn't help with he took off to start exploring. I kept track of him through Demonreach, just in case. The island might not be trying to hurt him, but there were plenty of things that could happen naturally.

By the time I had everything set up and secured it was starting to get dark. I built up a small fire and started cooking up a quick meal. Nothing fancy, just beans, which Mouse was not allowed to have, and some hotdogs. Mouse returned to the clearing, panting and filthy, radiating pure canine happiness. He'd rolled around in fields of flowers, chased rabbits and deer, though he didn't catch any of them. Mouse could have, of course, he had no trouble keeping up with cars, he just didn't want to. Chasing was more fun than catching if you weren't hungry I guess.

We sat for a few minutes, eating and enjoying the fresh air and the noises of the evening. As I fished out my bag of marshmallows I became aware of an uneven gait crossing the open ground between the edge of the woods and my fire in front of the keepers house. I looked up to see the manifestation of Demonreach walking towards us. 

It came forward slowly, still incredibly tall and mostly unseen inside the huge cloak it wore. Which, I noted as it came into the circle of light from the fire, was a dark green and similar in design to the Wardens' cloaks. I clamped down on my rising confusion. It was extremely rare for a _genius loci_ to manifest during a _sanctum_ claiming. It was, as far as I knew, unheard of for one to manifest a physical form at any other point. Ever. 

Mouse's ears pricked up as he watched Demonreach, but he didn't make any other moves. He wasn't feeling threatened. I got to my feet because it was polite and gave Demonreach a small bow.

“Greetings, Demonreach.” 

Green eyes flickered to life inside the hood and Demonreach _shrank_. I could tell that it was happening, but I couldn't exactly see it even though I was looking right at it. The physical form Demonreach had called up stopped when it was about seven and a half, maybe eight feet tall. It made it easier to look at the hood of the cloak and not get a crick in my neck.

“ _Greetings, Keeper Dresden_.” The voice that rumbled out of the depths of the hood was more than just words. I could feel it inside of my head, not unpleasant, but very much there and alive. It gave the impression, somehow, of masculinity. I amended my thoughts of Demonreach from 'it' to 'him'. I hadn't thought guardian spirits would have a gender, but what the hell did I know?

We straightened and stood there, looking at each other for a long minute. Then Mouse whuffed and I heard the crinkle of the plastic bag of marshmallows. I turned to look at him over my shoulder. Mouse was holding the bag carefully in his teeth and looking at us with big brown eyes. I laughed and faced Demonreach again. 

“Would you like to join us? I was about to toast some marshmallows.” 

That massive head tilted, first one way and then the other and then he nodded. I crouched down beside the fire again, turned so that I could keep one eye on Demonreach. I didn't expect an attack, but it struck me as rude to just turn my back on him. And more than a little hair raising. _Sanctum_ or not, Demonreach was an incredibly powerful non-human creature. If I hadn't smacked it- _him_ in the nose he would have killed me without thinking about it even for a second.

The first marshmallow browned and crisped up nicely in a few seconds. I lifted the stick from the fire and stood, holding it out to Demonreach. He took it, a hand emerging from the cloak that was essentially human looking, only out of proportion. Too large, just like the rest of him, and all of the fingers were the same length, the thumb longer than it should have been as well, but not as long as the rest. Rough, scarred, and fascinating. He held the end of the stick and just stood there, making no move to eat the marshmallow, or giving a hint that he knew what the hell it was.

Right. Ancient spirit. How many marshmallows did I think he'd shared with the people who'd lived here before anyway? He'd been too busy killing everyone to make friends. I knelt down and toasted a second marshmallow, then I made a show of slowly eating it, showing Demonreach how it was done even as I thought about it, opening up my mind to him again so that the thoughts would flow unimpeded.

There was the warm ruffle of him moving over my thoughts again, not deeply, just taking the images I was projecting. Then Demonreach lifted the stick and the cooled marshmallow and it vanished into the blackness of his hood. Sticky, gummy sounds of chewing emerged; so he did have a mouth. Or had made himself one when he needed it. I found myself wondering what Demonreach looked like, beneath the hood. Those green-fire eyes flared for a moment and I got an impression of foreign pleasure.

I smiled at him.

“Good, right?”

“ _Strange_.” A thrum of power and Demonreach was gone, but not gone. His physical form vanished without a fade or any hint that it was going, but I could still feel the connection, and through it, Demonreach. He had gone...elsewhere. Some place where a body was not needed.

Mouse huffed and nudged the bag with his nose.

“Right, right. Sorry.” I fished out another marshmallow and speared it onto the stick I'd made for Mouse. Then I held it out. He grabbed the thicker end and thrust the treat into the flames. Mouse liked his burnt and I wasn't going to be a party to such desecration.

That first night established the pattern for the next three weeks. By day I worked on the keepers' house, patching the roof and working on the doors, making the place warmer and safer. I wasn't anything like a real do-it-yourself-er, but I'd gotten instructions from Michael, written them down so that I couldn't screw them up. In the end, the roof wouldn't leak and I'd be able to shut the doors and not have wind scream through the cracks. That was all I needed. It didn't have to look pretty. I could feel Demonreach, if I let myself. Feel the entire island without thinking. I tried not to do it too often, just a check now and again on Mouse and to make certain that no one had shown up without an invitation. It was too easy to lose myself in the awareness of everything on the island. Not just the living creatures, but the plants and the rocks, the water where it touched Demonreach's shore. I thought, sometimes, that I could feel the roots of the island. Down deep in the Earth's crust. It was disconcerting. Most of the time I kept it pushed back; a low, quiet feeling that filled up enough of the empty spaces in my mind that I didn't have to think about anything else.

When night fell, Mouse returned from his rambles and I cooked dinner. Demonreach would arrive at some point and I would give him a little bit of the food. He started to stay longer, to show up earlier. Demonreach never ate much, never spoke much. He just appeared outside of the house, ate a little and sat there watching me. I could feel the curiosity in his regard, and no malice. Demonreach was learning about me.

I grew used to him and part of me missed Demonreach when he left, even knowing that he was never truly gone.

Sometime near the beginning of the second week, the presents started showing up on my doorstep. Little things. Plants that I recognized as useful for potions once they'd been dried out, a couple of tools that I had left lying around the island to pick up later and not gone back for yet. A dead rabbit once, just when I was starting to wonder what I was going to cook that night. It was Demonreach, without question.

I didn't ask him about it when he came to dinner, or when he started showing up in the shadows at the edge of the clearing while I was working. It didn't seem right, to try and vocalize something that we both understood. Demonreach was showing affection, appreciation for all the work I'd done. He wanted the house fixed up, for some reason. I didn't know why a being like Demonreach cared about a mortal building, but he seemed to.

By the end of my fourth week on the island the repairs to the keepers' house were done and it was time to get back to civilization. I didn't feel better about what had happened, but I felt refreshed somehow. Less ready to jump off the edge. It was good. On the last day of my retreat I packed up all my gear and carried everything I wouldn't need for the night down to the _Water Beetle_. With that done, I headed deeper into the island's interior, toward the small pool of cool, clean water that lay in the woods maybe five minutes walk from the top of the hill.

Mouse was on the other side of the island, chasing birds and playing in the waves. Demonreach was incorporeal, as usual. I stripped out of my shirt, kicked off my boots and pulled off my jeans and my socks, letting the warm breeze begin to dry the sweat on my skin. The pool was spring fed, clear all the way to the sandy bottom eight feet down and inhabited only by tiny fish. It was a little slice of heaven.

I dove in, keeping the angle fairly shallow. No need to brain myself the last day. The water was cold, but not too cold for me. Years of nothing but cold showers had given me what I thought ought to be honorary membership to the Polar Bear Club. I feared no chilly water, and the water here was just cold enough to be refreshing, not to shrink anything important.

After a few minutes of swimming I became aware of a tingle against my senses. I grabbed the rounded stone that had caught my eye on my last dive and surfaced. Demonreach stood at the edge of the pool, the hood of his cloak pushed back. I shook water out of my hair and stared. His face was mostly human but like the rest of him it was just a little off. His eyes, still glowing with green fire, were a little too large, a little too far apart. Demonreach's nose looked as if it had been broken; there were scars on his face that twisted the skin and made it look like something alive carved from a tangled tree branch or the crumbling face of a cliff. But animated, mobile. Put it all together and the form Demonreach had made for himself was handsome in a way. There was a personality there that brought it all together. Alien, but not remote or incomprehensible.

I kicked over until I could touch bottom and started to climb out of the pool. Demonreach waited for me, hands buried beneath his cloak. I grabbed my towel and scrubbed it over my body quickly then tied it around my waist. I hadn't been planning on putting the dirty clothes back on. 

“ _You are leaving here_.” 

“Yes. Tomorrow morning. I need to get back to Chicago.”

Demonreach's arms came out, spreading the cloak wide and I saw that he wasn't wearing anything like clothing beneath the cloak. The rest of his body was built on the same lines as his face and hands. Not quite human, but the differences all worked together. There was a long, jagged scar that ran from the front of his right thigh around the back of that calf. His limp. I wondered, not for the first time, how Rashid had done that and survived. Looking up from the scar I noted that, whether or not Demonreach was actually male or just felt that way interpreted through my brain, the body he had built for himself was very much male. Was that influenced by his connection to me? Or was Demonreach male by nature?

“ _New staff_.” Demonreach held out a long, heavy piece of wood. Oak, maybe. Good enough to make a new staff out of. I could tell without touching it because I could feel it through Demonreach. I took it with another small bow of my head.

“Thank you. It's perfect.” It was. I could see the staff I would make out of it already. 

“ _Make it here. I will help you make it better. It will take time._ ”

I gave a mental shrug and bobbed my head in a nod. I already had a staff and a backup piece of wood I'd brought back from Hog Hollow the last time I visited Ebenezar. It cost me nothing to work on a third staff here. 

“Thank you. Again.” 

I turned and set the length of wood down beside my rock. When I straightened back up, Demonreach was right in front of me. I jumped back a little with a yelp. He had been forming himself closer and closer to my own height, but Demonreach was still massive and having him just _appear_ like that, without even a hint of warning through our bond was startling.

“I- is there something-”

“ _You are the guardian. You belong here._ ” Those massive, strange hands came up to press gently against my cheeks, holding my head still. I stared up into Demonreach's eyes and felt no fear. Demonreach, for all that he wasn't human or anything I had ever encountered before, was not a threat to me. “ _You can feel it. The pull of here. It is why you repaired the guardian's place_.” I licked my and cleared my throat.

“I fixed up the house as a refuge. And I do feel something, some draw to the island, but that's because of you.”

“ _I AM here, Guardian_.” Demonreach tilted his head to the side again, a vaguely puzzled feel to his side of the bond. I got what he was saying and felt a little stupid. Demonreach _was_ the island. It was hard to keep that in mind when he was walking around on top of himself though. I kept separating the physical island from the manifestation of Demonreach in my mind.

“Right, right. Yes.” I tried to step back but Demonreach's grip wouldn't let me move. Still, there was no hint of aggression. There was something else though. A...it was hard to put into a frame of reference I understood. Clinging, but without the neediness that word usually implied. Possessiveness without the darker aspects of it. Demonreach felt that I belonged to the _here_ , to the island, as much as any of the other animals did. Which meant that Demonreach felt I belonged with him. I couldn't suppress the shiver that went through me with that thought. If Demonreach did decide to keep me here, I wasn't entirely sure I could leave. I'd run out of soulfire long before Demonreach ran out of power.

“ _I would not_.” Demonreach let me go and I took a long step back from him. “ _My Guardian must be free. I would-_ ” What I interpreted as frustration rippled through Demonreach and then I got a carefully controlled line of images. The manifestation of Demonreach and a man I didn't recognize. They sat together on the top of the hill, only it wasn't the hill as it existed now. The clearing was little more than a wide space between three trees. The man was leaning his shoulder against Demonreach's, the both of them leaning over a large stone in their laps. There was no sound, but I knew that they were crafting a spell, binding it into the stone. Another image, Demonreach and the same man on the shore. They were- hells bells. Demonreach and the unnamed wizard were having very enthusiastic looking sex. I blinked and the image changed to Demonreach and another wizard, a woman this time, in the woods near this pool. Vines writhed over her, over them, alive and- hells bells. That was just- they were really talented vines, from the looks of things. Again and again, different wizards, the island changing with time, but always the same. Working together and then having sex. Demonreach and the wizard entangling their magic and their bodies.

“Oh.” I looked away from him and then back. “I- uh. I didn't realize.” I swallowed hard. Those hadn't been gifts of thanks for fixing up the keepers' house. They'd been courting gifts. Hells bells, I was a moron. I flushed, guilt, embarrassment and not a little bit of arousal boiling through me. Those images, the way Demonreach and the other wizards had moved together. It had been beautiful. But I wasn't- I couldn't have that. Not now. Maybe not ever. Demonreach moved back, let the cloak shut around his body.

“ _You are young. Wounded._ ” Flashes of Captain Luccio, Morgan, _Peabody_ flitted through my mind, followed by Susan and Elaine. Wounded. Yeah. Maybe a little. “ _There is time_.”

“I have to go back to Chicago. Things are happening and I need to be there.”

“ _You will return. To work on your staff_.”

“Yes. Every chance I get.” I bundled up my clothes, wrapped the rock in them and tucked the uncarved staff under my arm. “You'll be up for dinner, right? We're having fish.” A moment of silence and then Demonreach nodded, smiling. 

_Two years and six months later_

I shifted on the soft bedding of the grass beneath me, rolled my hips up and gasped as one of the vines, thicker than the ones wrapped around my erect cock slid up into me. The leafless thing wriggled inside of me, moving in ways that nothing should move, as if it had a will and a mind of its own. Demonreach was sitting a few feet away, his back against one of the trees. Thick, leafy vines tightened on my arms and legs, spread them a little further. 

With part of my mind dug deep into the bond I could see myself as Demonreach saw me. Naked, pinned to the earth. My skin covered in sweat and dirt, muscles standing out as I tugged and writhed, cursing him with a laughing, breathless voice. It was like bilocation, only better. I could feel Demonreach's pleasure as well as my own. It was, almost literally, mind blowing. 

A second vine joined the first, the two of them wrapping around each other inside of me, forming a braid that wriggled and pulsed, rubbing against me with barely enough pressure to send sparks of electric heat through me. Demonreach was a sadistic bastard. I could feel and see, through Demonreach's eyes, a third vine, thicker that the other two put together, creeping up my leg.

“Get over here already!” I yelped, my voice breaking on the moan as that third vine shot forward, drove in beside the others and moved against their pace, sliding in when they pulled out, the tip of it curling inside of me, a tiny, hot point of exquisite torture. It blinded me to everything but itself and the feeling of it within me.

~

I pulled the small speed boat up to the dock, opposite the side where Dresden had tied off his ridiculous vessel. For a few minutes after I'd tied off I stood on the gently rolling deck and stared at the shore. It was just an island. Nothing more. After a while I convinced my limbs to move, to jump up onto the dock and take the first few steps toward the shore. Something screamed from the interior, a bird perhaps. It sounded human. I stopped, my heart rate spiking, my skin going cold. Pain throbbed in my hands, my ear.

_Perfectly normal fear response. You're tough, Boss, but you're still human. Adapt to survive. The fear can be a tool. You know this._ I glanced back at the boat, half expecting to see Mr. Hendricks there, giving me this little pep talk from the prow. He'd been urging me to make a trip out to this cursed island for more than a year. I'd ignored him. Dresden's return and residency had given me a perfectly logical reason for the last six months. But Mr. Hendricks was not there and wouldn't be ever again if a cure was not found. I grit my teeth and moved quickly, my boots hitting the wet sand before I had time to think about it any longer.

Mr. Hendricks was ill. I needed Dresden's expertise to undo the curse. I would find him and drag him back to Chicago by his ridiculous coat if need be.

The island looked different in the day, without snow and crazed lunatics covering it. I oriented myself, found the path that would lead up to the top of the hill and moved.

Ten minutes into the hike I became convinced that the feeling of being watched that made my skin prickle was not in my head. There was something wrong with this place. A nexus of dark power, Ms. Gard had said. The reason the Denarians had chosen it for their base. She'd asked me not to contact Dresden without her for that very reason. Mr. Hendricks could not afford any further delay, and she had not yet returned from Oslo.

I slowed my pace and began to move more cautiously. It saved me from a neck breaking fall three steps later when a stone shifted beneath my boot, knocking me off balance. I caught myself on a tree to my right, tearing my hands open on the bark as I did. Wind growled through the trees as I righted myself, coming from nowhere. The skies had been clear when I docked, the sun bright in the sky. Now that I was under the trees the natural light was almost completely strangled by the leaves and branches, leaving me in near total darkness. 

Something moved through the brush, out of sight. I bared my teeth in the direction of the noise and stood straight, wiping the bloody palms of my hands on my jeans. The feeling of being surrounded, of being watched, increased. I'd felt it before, in my youth, in hell holes all around the world just before things blew up. I'd felt it a few times in the war for Chicago, and I'd felt it when the Denarians had first brought me to this island. There was something here and it was _dangerous_.

I resumed my climb up the hill, moving cautiously but at a steady pace. No other stones crumbled beneath my feet. I saw nothing, no matter how surreptitiously I attempted to make my scans of the woods around me, but I could hear them moving. They wanted me to. I had no doubts that whatever was out there could move in absolute silence if it chose. It wanted me to be afraid, jumpy. To make a mistake. I understood the thinking. I'd used it myself when the occasion called for it.

As I climbed I turned part of my mind to some of the things I had leaned by rote, letting the litany they formed steady me. I mentally disassembled and reassembled half a dozen different firearms, reciting the names of each piece as I did. By the time I finished with my old M16A2 I reached the end of the stairway and the clearing at the top of the hill. Dresden had been busy. 

A garden, small and just beginning to bud, was fenced off to one side of the stone hut. He had strung some line in the sun between two large trees. It was either a line for drying certain foods and herbs, or for his laundry. Perhaps even both, depending on his need. And there was a permanent fire pit, lined with stones. It looked nothing like what it had during my involuntary visit. 

Nothing moved, even the wind that had whipped through the trees earlier had gone. I was still being watched, invisibly. I was not welcome here. 

I stepped into the middle of the clearing and turned in a slow circle. Nothing.

“Dresden!” My shout was ripped away on the wind that resumed as soon as I opened my mouth. A shiver shot down my spine. There had been a human voice in that wind. Dresden's voice, wordlessly crying out. I turned to where I thought the cry had come from and found a hint of a path, something not really broken but only suggested. My ear throbbed in time with my heartbeat and it itched, an unceasing annoyance that made me want to scratch at it. Nervous habit. I couldn't afford those.

I drew my gun and took the safety off as I moved into the tree line, forcing the branches to bend out of my way. They scratched at me with rough edges and unseen thorns. I ignored them and moved as quietly as I could.

Gradually, I began to hear Dresden's voice, muffled and cursing. There was another voice, strangely modulated and not quite human. I remembered the way the Denarians had sounded in their demonic forms. Was it the same? It could be. They had not been identical. Roots began to rise out of the earth, turning the clear little trail into an invitation to a broken leg. I stepped around them carefully and watched my back as best I could. There was movement all around me. I would have written it off as animals, if they hadn't been moving so perfectly in concert with one another. And with me. My imagination gifted me with the ridiculous image of rabbits stalking me through the woods, their eyes glowing bright red like that creature in the children's books I'd read to Amanda the year before. Bunnicula. I clamped down on the laughter and stopped moving, crouching down low. The path broke open a few feet in front of me.

I crab walked forward until I could see through the break in the brush. A small clearing around a pool of water. Dresden's coat lay immediately in my path, beside a shirt, torn nearly in half. I followed a trail of clothing that grew more and more tattered as it went until another shout of “Hells bells!” drew my eyes to the other side of the pool.

Dresden was on his hands and knees, bright green ropes around his arms, trailing up around his back. His head was sagging forward, limp in contrast to the tension of his shoulders and his arms as they struggled to keep him from falling face first into the dirt. Grunts escaped him as he was pushed forward and then dragged back again and again by the creature crouching over him. It was huge, humanoid but seemingly carved from the earth itself. 

The island was evil, and it attracted monsters. Monsters strong enough to bring Dresden down. I drew in a steadying breath and took a few steps backward. I needed to get around to a better angle. If I shot from here I would almost certainly hit Dresden. I rose and glanced through the leaves to get one last look to orient my movements by.

The creature, so close to human it merely made it more monstrous, raised it's head and our eyes met, green orbs of fire that flared up into an inferno in that face. Huge hands clamped down around Dresden's arms with terrible force and he screamed, his voice echoing in the clearing but muffled as soon as it hit the trees. I found myself in the clearing, with no memory of taking those steps out of my compromised hiding place. 

I was aiming for the dark brown skin between those brilliant, malevolent eyes, braced and ready to fire. A movement drew my attention, closer to me than the creature. I had a second of disbelief, where my mind refused to process what it was seeing, and then it responded to the facts. A tree was bending toward me, the roots starting to pull out, but the trunk was twisting, not breaking. It was _moving_ , attacking me. It was ridiculous. Then I remembered the Ents and what had happened to the Uruk-hai at Isengard.

I shot the tree.

A snarl ripped through the woods and more trees moved, branches and vines whipping out at me, blinding me and fouling my aim. I dodged and fired into the trees, shattering branches. I could barely hear Dresden shouting over the howling that filled the air and the steady whumpwhumpwhump of my rounds hitting wood.

“Dammit! Both of you STOP!”

Cold wrapped my hands, sank in with wicked teeth until my fingers refused to obey me any longer. My gun fell to the ground, dropped from nerveless hands. The trees had stopped moving. I looked to my side to see Dresden, naked and seemingly unconcerned by it. He walked toward me, a furious cast to his features.

“What in the hell is wrong with you?”

The cold was easing away a little more every second. I flexed my fingers and was pleased that they did not immediately shatter as though they were made of glass. 

“I was _rescuing_ you.” I could not see the creature any longer. Had it been a part of the woods? Had I wounded it somehow?

Dresden tilted his head to one side, a gesture he had not been prone to before and regarded me steadily. “Rescuing me? From Demonreach?”

“Demon-”

Dresden waved his hand to the space behind me. I craned my head around, turning my upper body only when I had no choice. The creature was behind me, teeth bared in a snarl. An impressively sharp looking branch was in his hands, not quite aimed at my back. I knew, without a doubt, that it had been aimed at me until Dresden had called a stop to the proceedings. Merciful God. This island was insane.

“Demonreach. He's the guardian of the island. And he's not going to hurt you.” The creature, Demonreach, shrugged and tossed the branch over its head. It crashed to the earth somewhere in the woods. “Demonreach, this is Baron John Marcone. Marcone, this is Demonreach. Try not to kill one another in the next minute, please. I need to find my pants.”

“Over there.” I pointed, numb enough with shock to be helpful.

“Thanks.” Dresden jogged over to retrieve some of his clothing, leaving Demonreach and I alone. We looked at each other and then turned to watch Dresden. He yanked the jeans up, picked up the shirt and then threw it back down as a lost cause. “Really? Another one?” He looked at Demonreach. The creature shrugged and smiled, the change in expression making it seem less inhuman. “Right then. What brings you all the way out here?”

“Someone has placed a curse on Mr. Hendricks.”

“What sort of a curse?”

“I am...unsure. I only know that it has changed his personality to a small degree. It is driving him to act out of character. Ms. Gard believes that it is the work of an old acquaintance of Vadderung's. I am more inclined to believe that it is the work of someone a bit closer to home. It has the taste of familiarity about it.” He opened his mouth and I cut him off. I was not taking no for an answer this time. “I am requesting your aid, Warden Dresden, in dealing with this instance of black magic.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Dresden sighed and scooped up his coat. It wasn't quite identical to the one he had lost, but it was close enough and I could see the same carefully etched spells in the leather. “Let's go save Cujo.”

We did not speak of anything but business until the next day, when Mr. Hendricks was sleeping peacefully in Ms. Gard's arms and I was driving him back to the docks to return to his island.

“You shot a tree.”

“I believe I shot several trees, if you will recall. They were being rather threatening.”

“Demonreach doesn't really like unannounced guests. But you _shot_ a _tree_. What did you think that was going to do? It's a _tree_.” 

I continued to drive and said nothing. Dresden managed to be silent for an entire minute.

“I'll have a discussion with Demonreach, once I'm back. Get him to not, you know, kill you the second you put foot on the island the next time.”

“There will not be a next time. That island is evil.” I shook my head. “I don't understand how you can bear to live there.”

“Demonreach isn't evil, just antisocial. It's easier to keep people from doing stupid things with the power out there if there aren't any people on the island. So he drives them off. Or kills them. It's not _evil_ , just incredibly practical. I'd think you could appreciate that.”

“It hasn't driven you off.”

“No. We reached an understanding some years back. There's...hell. It's a strange sort of relationship, yeah. Are you waiting for me to blush and stammer and tell you you didn't see what you thought you saw?”

It was my turn to be silent. I had, in truth, expected some sort of denial. He had never shown anything but an almost stereotypical maidenly blush when sex was brought up before. Dresden had changed since he'd gone down to South America.

I pulled into the parking lot of the marina and put the car into park, waiting for Dresden to climb out and vanish again until I needed him. Or he decided to set something on fire. He remained buckled in, watching me.

“You know, I have some charms back at the cabin that would help prevent this sort of spell from taking hold again. You could come out with me and get them.”

I frowned. He hadn't mentioned- no matter. If Dresden had something that I could use to keep my employees from being harmed like this again I would take it. He didn't offer the use of his magic often. Not to me at any rate.

“Let me park the car.”

Dusk was settling in as I pulled my boat up to the dock once more. Dresden stood on the shore, staring at the interior of the island with a distracted expression. I cut the engine and tied off, climbing onto the dock with less grace than normal. At the end of the dock I hesitated, waiting for Dresden to turn around.

“You ready? We have to climb up to the cabin.”

“I thought I might remain here. You can return with the-”

“No.” He turned, shaking his head. “There're instructions and I don't want to have to explain to Cujo how I let you catch a cold while I sat in my nice warm house. Come on.” 

My ear was itching again. I found the hilt of one of the small throwing knives strapped to the back of my belt and ran my fingers over it. The steel was body warm and soothing. 

“Lead on.” 

Dresden led us up the hill by another path, one that took half the time to reach the summit as the one through the woods. There was already a fire laid in the outdoors pit, the flames tinged with green-gold at their edges. 

Demonreach was seated by the fire, three sticks held in those massive hands, the ends hidden in the leaping flames.

“ _Baron Marcone._ ” It pulled the sticks from the fire, revealing carefully browned marshmallows on the end of each. Demonreach held them out to me, eyes contracted to tiny singularities of green light. I looked at Dresden.

“It's tradition. Guests, of which we have few, get the first bite. Go on. I swear it's safe.” He turned and headed into the cabin. To fetch the charms, supposedly.

I moved forward until I was standing over the creature and looking down at the gooey treats. Demonreach watched me with no expression on its face. I could recognize this for what it was. A gesture of welcome and apology. After a moment of consideration, only half of my attention on the marshmallows themselves, I chose the stick that had left the fire last, the most charred marshmallow. 

It was just as good as I remembered, from childhood. Just a little too hot, the melting insides sticking to my mouth, my tongue, melting further and sending droplets of sweetness over my tastebuds. I savored it, only returning the empty stick to Demonreach once I'd eaten every last bit of the marshmallow.

“Thank you.”

Demonreach nodded his head a little. Dresden emerged from the hut a moment later, a satchel in his hands.

“Here's the charms.” He shook the bag. “Did you two make up?”

“I believe so.”

Dresden cocked his head to the side again and Demonreach did the same. Dresden's eyes went distant, as though he were looking at something no one else could see.

“Good.” Straightening up, Dresden handed me the bag, his hands brushing mine in a long, lingering gesture. “Stay for dinner?”


End file.
